has cost tens of thousands of lives, syria's only friends in the world have been naturally iran and china but also their best friends, russia. russia. and that was true until today. russia today did not formally declare that they're no longer going to support the syrian government against the rebels, but for the first time a high-ranking russian official said publicly that yeah, it looks like assad is going to lose this war. i mean, the united states has been saying that forever. nato has been saying that forever. everybody who wants assad to go has been saying that forever. you try to create an air of inevitability about the thing you want to happen. right? that makes sense. but now for the other side to be saying it, for syria's best friend to be saying yeah, syria, you're going to lose this, it's going to happen, that is a huge, huge deal. it is sometimes hard to follow the day-to-day news out of this war, to know what is an important day and what is just another awful day. but this is a really important moment. because syria was sort of down to their last friend in the world. and if t